The Hood Doesn’t Get Bangers (TNG S1E1-2)

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Welcome to the greatest generation, the next generation. It's a Star Trek podcast by a couple of guys just a little bit embarrassed about having a Star Trek podcast. I'm Adam Pranica.

I'm Ben Harrison. We are starting that loop back around. Big day for the show. Big day for for us.

Yeah.

We're a rewatch podcast now, Ben.

We are uh yeah, this this makes us a re rewatch, doesn't it?

It does.

My wife was trying to tell Darone, my little boy, about um what my show is. Very hard for him to understand because, you know, his favorite T V show is like Daniel Stripe a Tiger and doesn't really understand what a podcast even is. But uh he said, Daddy I think you should name your show Live Long and Strawberry.

God, what an idiot.

Ha ha ha.

As a parent, you can't just say what I said to your own kid, but you gotta be thinking it, right?

All I was thinking about was the t shirt that I need to make now.

Hot shopped up is is where you will find uh any old band idea that goes immediately from his brain to the store, passing directly through whatever uh approval process we used to have. Hot shop. I love it personally. It's a big surprise.

It's just a a good feeling to know that we're uh we're back in the saddle. Friends of the Soto, not abandoning us.

Now

We hope.

We've unpacked in our new home. I love unpacking in a new home. I hate packing. Unpacking, excellent.

Putting it uh putting everything where it's supposed to go, deciding where things are gonna go.

Yeah.

You get to do that cool thing where you step back in a room and kinda like Picture like what if the couch was like there?

Right. Right. What if we uh move a couple of the segments around? See how that feels.

We've also talked about this specific episode more than once. because we also did the re encounter at Far Point live show uh a couple of years ago.

I mean it can't be because there's so much there.

I was gonna kind of say the opposite. Like I know that we have watched this episode a lot and the first time we recorded about it it was like a twenty-five minute little thing. But like I watched it this time and I was like I have so much to talk. Th so many things I'm noticing this time through that I haven't in previous watches. And I kind of think that that's What I'm most excited about with rewatching Star Trek The Next Generation.

I think that's why people rewatch it. Like I went out and asked a couple of FODs, like, why do you re-watch it? Do you think most people watch it one time or d are are they re-watching it all the time? And Universally they were like, I don't know anyone who's only seen this once.

Yeah.

And they were like I asked three people. Yeah. And the first one was like, It's comfort T V to me. And it feels optimistic in a way that a lot of T V isn't right now. And then the second guy was like, I catch things that I didn't notice the first time, new details and shit, and that makes me happy.

I think that's fair. Well, I don't think we should tarry any longer. I think we should get right into this thing.

Yeah, let's go back to uh September twenty eighth, nineteen eighty seven. I was eight, you were uh three.

Three, yeah, you're right.

Amazing. It's uh the pilot episode of Star Trek The Next Generation and it is called Encounter at Far Point.

Ben, I don't remember this opening scene and first shot, and I've seen this episode a bunch, but when I popped in the the Blu-ray as I'm enjoying these episodes this time through, we open On a starfield, and for some reason a set of stairs And when the enterprise depends on the

Get a load of this ship!

We get our beauty shots right out of the way here and uh what a hottie. Absolutely bad from every angle.

Bad from every angle is is how I describe the the Lego model, Ben, and I noticed you have that enterprise Lego model behind you.

Yeah.

That the viewers can see.

I honestly like watching this episode noticed some more things that are wrong with the Lego model.

That's hilarious.

Uh so we yeah, we get our captain's log and he's in his ready room. I noticed that this is the only shot of the non-Battle Bridge Ready Room that we get. But yeah, he's uh talking about how they're gonna go out to Far Point station and after that, whole galaxy is their oyster. But uh when he walks onto the bridge, Lieutenant Torres says something strange is on his detector circuit. Some real TOS language right at the beginning here. Uh I don't know if I noticed the last time.

Ha ha ha ha.

It is incredible how poorly miked folks on the bridge are right off the bat.

Yeah.

It kind of emphasizes how large the space is, because a lot is made of Picard's description of his brand new ship, you know, being so large, being so technologically advanced. The largeness is emphasized from jump, I think.

The characters that get emphasized from Jump are really Picard, Data, and Troy. Like they get introductions in this opening scene where, you know, we learn that Data has uh a feeble understanding of idiomatic language and a crazy encyclopedic brain. Uh we learn about Troy uh being able to sense things on a level that we might not personally be able to sense them.

Yeah.

It is breathtaking how bad of a data episode this turns out to be. I feel like right from the beginning, because I was really reminded about how unprepared data seem to be for this assignment. Like misunderstanding words and meanings of words right away, that seems to be kind of a crucial part of your job. If you are serving at his station.

I also noticed the uh the makeup on data is really inconsistent throughout the episode. Like all the stuff in the holodeck looks exactly like that camera test. footage of data that that goes around every so often. But he looks pretty normal here. And they come across this thing that they're detecting and it's a giant chain link fence in space.

Yeah, uh like Renaissance era captain and Renaissance era speech.

Yeah. Go back whence thou camest.

He should be eating a turkey leg or something.

When he says we call ourselves the Q, I was wondering like is does that imply like it's the royal we? Like did they know that there were gonna be other Qs at this point or is this just the three dimensional expression of the Q? In our universe.

Torres talks so much i in the beginning, Ben. I know you developed an attachment to this character. Uh he gets frozen right away. Yeah.

Really terrible. Uh he was just gonna stun him too. Like his phaser wasn't set to kill.

You can tell Picard's kind of in awe of this power, the freezing power I mean. And I mean they just gotta use this effect again when I saw how good it was.

Ha ha ha.

In the beginning, right?

Yeah, so good. Q is like yeah, I would never let you guys get the drop on me. That's just foolish given what we know about humans. They rush Lieutenant Torres to Sixth Bay. I personally would have rushed him to Thaw Bay, but you know, maybe it's a little bit further away.

The facilities on board a galaxy class starship don't include like the soaking tubs of a national football league team.

For example. Right, yeah. So many things have advanced in the future, but uh athlete medicine, not one of them.

We have talked a lot about, you know, future cryo pod and wiping the frost from it in order to see what's inside. Taurus is the pod.

Yeah.

No one wipes his face like I might have expected. You could do that, right, without hurting him, or is the risk that he's actually frozen and you you could like actually rub off his face. Right. Rub his face off.

He doesn't shatter like the T one thousand when he like hits the floor though. So I don't think he's quite rose in liquid nitrogen frozen.

No, he's he's definitely bendy. Yeah.

Got a little bit of flex to him. Q becomes like a World War II guy and also a captain in that case.

Yeah.

He's like just saying like humans are these are these brutes that he can't allow to venture out into the galaxy. You guys gotta go home. And Picard is protesting, we're not like that. We used to be. Like the guy you're dressed as is definitely not something we're proud of, but We've moved on. That nonsense is centuries behind us. Q does uh another costume change, and now he is drugs soldier.

The detail I really enjoyed this time was between all the costume changes, John Delancey's face also changes. Like as drugged up warrior, his eyes are super sunken and dark.

Yeah.

He looks strung out. He really does good work here in this scene.

Lawyer Bicard just cannot help himself. He puts all of this argument about whether humans are any good and can be allowed into the galaxy in terms of make your case and Q just loves this idea. The whole thing is it was Picard's idea. And Q is like, okay, I gotta go uh get my judging play set ready. I'll be back.

Picard totally does that thing where Gozer asks him a question and Picard accidentally thinks of the Staypuff Marshmallow Man and that is the trial that we end up getting.

I couldn't help it.

It just popped in there. You want that judge if you're going to trial. Super soft, right?

Yeah. You're fucking ten plybud. Whorf and Yarr want to fight the queue and they're like, Come on, this is not a time to to cut and run. But Troy's like, You guys like you're not seeing this thing the way I'm seeing it. It is freaking me out the level of power here. Like there's no way we can do anything to damage it. We gotta go.

It's interesting that the course Picard chooses is a combination of those two suggestions, the fighting and the fleeing. Yeah.

I mean this is the ship that is Porquenolos Dos the ship. Right. And he's like, Yeah, we've got this galaxy class. We gotta do it. He makes an interesting caveat though, he's like all of the orders from now on will be done by printing them out on the ship and we're not gonna use any transmissions.

Because isn't there a quality to future paper that is interesting? Like I th it was Battlestar Galactica that showed us that like that their version of future paper was dot matrix printer paper only with uh the corners cut off. Yeah. Show us your future paper, Star Trek.

Nobody likes right angles on Caprica. You gotta cut those corners.

Exactly.

So we're printing orders out all over the ship. A lot of recycling is gonna have to get done at the end of this episode. There's a like just another beauty shot of engineering. Like it's it's very clear that they're very proud of this set, but they haven't thought of anything to do with it yet. So there's just like a wordless sequence where Worf goes into engineering, like says something to a guy you know, out of earshot and then comes back to the bridge and he's like, Yeah, we're ready to go.

There is a lot of fat this episode, like that, I think. And I love how dialogue free that moment is too. It's so fun. Seeing engineering this way made me wonder about like, you know, all of the paper that's gonna be generated by Picard's order. Do you think there's a possibility that you can use the warp core as a furnace? Like can you just throw your trash into it and have it burn? with antimatter and matter explosions?

But there's all this ash that builds up then and and like the the cool like blue uh toroi that stack are just full of full of dust and dirt because of that.

But like when we finally see the inside of where the dilithium is kept, there is a sort of like fireplace style iron shelf in there. That's that reminds me a lot of a fireplace.

Or is it like the paper tray in your office copy machine? Like you gotta like get it lined up just right and you gotta look at the little diagram to see which side the paper is gonna get printed on.

PC load letter? The fuck does that mean?

I mean

Nothing makes me angrier than my printer. Why are they so bad? They're all awful.

They've had my entire life to make a printer that is any good at all and they

Never get one.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So this becomes a race, with the D being chased by Q's collapsed fence, which is now turned into a glowing marble that chases them from behind. And I wanted to see through the legs. Like like we've been watching a bunch of TOS on Greatest Trek. And and my favorite shot in TOS is like Behind through the nacelles. Yeah.

Mrs. Robinson, you're trying to do this.

This was the opportunity for that and we don't get it. It's just a star field to the rear

It's it's really too bad. Is would would this thing be called a cue ball, Adam? Yeah.

Yeah, I can get with that.

Okay. So Troy talks about uh you know, this thing is I mean it's n it's maybe it's life, but it's like kind of past that from where we're sitting. Very, very different from us. But fortunately we've got this very, very fast ship and they are really opening it up. Like let's see what this engine's got. And they're up to 9.8 on the warpometer. And They're talking about how risky this is, like everything is being pushed past the red line. And Picard starts spinning out this let's get the ship.

Wharf immediately takes on bridge with this. So the Klingons and the kids go to the saucer section, right? And like the varsity team goes to the battle bridge. This is so humiliating for him.

I'm a cling on, sir. I'm sick of being on B Squad.

Listen, you may be on B Squadron, you're the B Squadron.

They head to the Battle Bridge and the separation sequence is like as long as we remember,'cause there's also like it is not just that they play the entire theme song, but they also have a huge montage of like thousands of extras walking around the ship, not in a panic, but with a tremendous amount of purpose. They show like Vulcans and their children. They show men in dresses. They show like very civilian looking people.

The actual mechanic of separating the saucer is something that gives me chills every time to watch. Like this moment hit. A hundred percent of the time for me. And it made me wonder like, in retrospect, did they do this the right amount of times for you in this series? Was it more than you expected? Was it less than you expected?

It was definitely less than I expected and I feel like it must have been so expensive to shoot because when you're shooting two models in the same shot, getting and and they're moving, like you actually have to mount them on something that will move them smoothly. Like almost always when you're shooting a a miniature spaceship like this, it's the camera that actually moves in the shot, not the not the model. The model is stationary and to get the

This entire sequence is made up of the best angles of these two parts of the ship. Yeah. I think later on in the episode, like there are bad angles of the star drive section that I wish they didn't show.

Totally agree. I was watching like toward the end there's a couple of shots of it in orbit of the planet. And I was like, if I walked in and I was like, this is the new Star Trek, fuck this.

It's bad. It looks really bad. And I think it's a quality to the wide shot. The star drive section just looks insignificant.

It really does.

In the wide shot that that is kind of unfortunate. In a way that the the saucer section looks pretty great, I think from a lot of angles.

I was also thinking, like, maybe this is kind of like a like a Greek philosopher puzzler. Are there two enterprises now? Does the registry number of one of them change? You know, is it like when the president is on an airplane that becomes Air Force One, no matter what airplane it is?

I think that's a great call. Yeah. Enterprise is where the captain is.

So uh they go to the battle bridge and Yara is like so keyed up to pick a fight with this Q and the card is so mean to her. He's like, Oh, you think we should fight it? I'm really curious to hear why you think that's a good idea. Will you please tell the group, Tashayar? I'd like to hear your advice. I spoke before I thought, sir.

I don't think it's mean, and I don't really feel like Picard is that mean throughout the episode. I think What we get here is a quality that we tend to get in new Star Trek 2, which is like a lot of random crew people piping up in situations. And we also get this in TOS quite a bit too. I think we asked this question on a recent episode, which was like,

Maybe not your place, Lieutenant Torres, but

So the star drive section turns around and stops. That's the plan. They're just gonna wait for Q to get there. And Picard surrenders. To a being whose only demonstrated power up to now is a space fence that they successfully escaped from when they saw it.

It becomes a space fence again and this time a spheroid that encircles them. And Q is like, all right, I got I got the play set going, and we go to the post-atomic horror. judicial play set. And the proximity of our bonus episode about this, I think, was the thing that made me think about it, but I have never made the connection at how time-banded the vibes in this are.

God time Bantus was weird.

It's such a weird movie and this feels so much like it in so many ways. Like I feel like they they got some like time bandit stills for the mood board when they were figuring out what these s scenes would look like.

There's a real quality of what the hell is this that I expected to be more centered on. the ship and the new crew and and everything having to do with this future technology if you're if you're watching Star Trek The Next Generation for the first time, that is instead right now, like, what the hell is this trial? The post? Atomic horror courtroom? Okay.

It is the era from which Drugo army guys come. And so there's one of them, you know, yelling at them and firing his his weird arm gun here and there.

He's playing Edward forty caliber hands, right? Like there's no taking off that gun to go to the bathroom. You gotta Yeah.

And then you realize you and all of your buddies have the gun and it's like, how are we gonna get out of this? I guess we gotta go somewhere and ask someone for help?

There's no one to take the gun off your hand when you're that guy.

He gets his ass kicked by Yarr and then his own guy comes over and pumps him full and because he lost.

But not before he's able to get one last snoot in before going. I saw this as like, man, what a lucky dude. He knows he's gonna get it. Why not do the snoop first?

Died doing what he loved.

Yeah.

This is like that uh character in Project Hail Mary that's like, Gimme all the heroine.

Yeah. I thought of that myself.

Uh, where does this dead soldier get pulled to when his foot is encircled with a rope and he is just dragged off screen?

I think they use Q's floating bench. Mm-hmm. Like what they do is they tie a rope around the foot, run it back down the tunnel, uh, around a corner, and then to the back of Q's bench, and as the bench floats out, What happens is the rope pulls the body in the other direction. It's very efficient that way, Ben.

This is a a society that is almost hellbent on efficiency.

Absolutely. Yeah.

So this is very clearly not the kind of trial anyone was hoping for. And Q is like, Yeah, I mean it it's gonna be fair, it'll be totally equitable.

Look at how fair I am. I'm gonna thaw out Tasha Yar after her violent outburst, just to show you that uh yeah, I'm merciful. Let's start this trial.

I think Yar is such an interesting character as a zealot of Starfleet. Like Starfleet being such a soft, cushy, nice coated thing, and she is like a I will defend with my life the soft cushy thing kind of person.

This episode really, really wants us to understand her deal as soon as possible in a way that you could save for an episode later. You don't need this right now. And I think that makes it challenging to an actor. Yeah. Like, I'm not sure if Denise Crosby knows who this character is yet. And and yet in this scene she's made to voice her position so passionately that it's super duper conspicuous.

It's kind of the main scene for Yar in a lot of ways. So you know, a very, very tiny window into what she's all about. Picard calls cue on this bullshit. It doesn't use the term drumhead, but like that's the kind of vibe of this trial and Uh he's like, you know, uh you said the prisoners wouldn't be harmed, now you're icing another crewman of mine. Like, maybe you're scared. Maybe you don't believe truly that you'll be able to prove your point about us being worthless savages.

And the racial connotation involved in this too, right? Like being of grievously savage race feels deeply unfair for Deanna Troy to defend. as a part of this. And I was thinking a lot about Wharf being away on the saucer. Like kind of a good thing he's not involved either, right? Because there is no way he's innocent in a trial where that's the charge.

Here's another thing I noticed on this watch around is when we learn about the Cardassian legal system in Deep Space Nine, they talk about it being guilty until proven innocent as the standard of justice there. And I feel like there's a lot of humans that are like, that is monstrous. Who would do that? And uh it's like one of those if you're pointing at someone, you got three fingies pointing back at yourself, humanity.

I was also thinking about the angle not taken by Picard, which is like, we're not the only spacefaring race in this galaxy. How did this trial go with the others? That inhabit this area. Like uh like you said, the Cardassians. Like how'd they do?

In this trial. Uh we hear a lot about the Ferengi in this episode. Were they uh pretty successful here or

Yeah. Yeah, none of that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Amen.

So Picard like sort of under duress pleads provisionally guilty. The grad filter on him when when he does this, absolutely insane. I think we've talked about that before. You can barely see the top of his face.

It's tough.

But with the promise of no legal trickery or finding loopholes or bullshit, we play back like the the words that Q used to describe what the trial is gonna be using tape recorder data. And Picard agrees, like, okay, like use the evidence of the mission that we're about to do to determine whether or not we can reasonably be called savage at this point in our development.

Can we please throw out The entirety of human history.

Yeah.

Can we start the recorder now? That would be great. That'd be more fair. Because honestly, I can't defend humanity up until now. We can't change the past, man.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Q is agreeable again here. He's like, Yeah, uh I'm not gonna litigate past people, but present people, you betcha. How about we use the Far Point station mission as that test? And and so the group is sent back to the battle bridge.

I love O'Brien being oblivious to the fact that everybody else in the room got pulled away for for reasons. What is present course, Khan? That's what it's been all long, sir.

Direct, heading to Far Point Station.

Makes the case for his entire career in Star Trek in this moment, in my opinion. And we cut to Far Point where we get Riker's Log. He just got dropped off by the hood, and he's waiting for the new ship that he's gonna be on. And uh meanwhile he's gonna be talking to this Glorzorn character

With what we know about the Hood and Captain DeSoto, do you think Riker's making a mistake?

Was he the first officer of the hood? Yeah. Or was he like the second officer of the hood, and this is his XO bid?

Oh I always had it in my head that he was the first officer.

Yeah.

That's gotta be so hard to leave the hood. I know, man. And You think they do that thing where they they put his uh his pickleball paddle into his shadow box and put it up on the wall

oh yeah

Yeah.

Hey, don't touch that stack of quarters. Uh we're leaving that there in memory. of one of the best pool players to ever serve on this vessel.

Riker can have a game anytime. Yeah. Anytime.

You know those aren't falling down when a banger gets dropped on the hood. The hood doesn't do shit like that.

Yeah, the hood doesn't get bangers. Unless the ones it makes itself. You know what I'm saying? Mm.

Speaking of bangers, this starbase is really impressive. And There is low-key some withering uh undertones in Riker saying that to Grappler Zorn, like, given what a hobo you and your people present as. Amazing work. And Grappler Zorn's like, yeah, just like so much geothermal energy. We just got it in droves. Anyways, want something to eat?

It's crazy how I'm not bumped by what Grappler Zorn looks like because future people wearing robes and being dirty and scrubby looking has been in Star Trek for a long time.

The amount of charoscuro between TOS and what I think of as T N G in the first season is Hard to overstate.

Great call. Great call. Yeah. The first strike against Riker, because we're just meeting him now, is that he likes red apples. I don't like that about him, but the way they appear for him arouses suspicions too. And when he leaves Grappler Zorn talks to the room about how it will need to be punished for doing something to make Riker suspicious, and the vibes are very much like

Yeah.

And then you like you throw that kid in the fucking trunk and they start messing with the brake lights to like send a signal to the traffic behind you. They can't do that.

I'm gonna pull this car over and roll up this racing form and come back there and give ya what for?

Yeah.

We meet Wes and Beverly out in the like shopping area of the star base. And he's like, hey, so like kind of a weird mystery afoot. What with this being such a fancy star base? And like, have you seen the rags these guys are wearing on their heads and bodies?

This shot of them is hilarious, Finn. I noticed something I've never noticed before in this moment. So we got the two shot with Beverly and Wes, and then we got like this this tree in the mall, and the tree is like built up on this. uh ring of cobblestones or whatever. For some reason Someone climbs up between the tree and Beverly and Wesley to cross to the other side of the courtyard instead of going around like behind the camera.

Yeah.

Doing.

You know, like New York, sometimes you're like on a sidewalk and there's a bunch of tourists that are just like they're moving at the pace that they're used to and you've gotta walk through the planter to get around them'cause you're like I got it, I got places to be. Yeah. That's what Far Point Station is kind of like. They start walking around. Uh, you know, Beverly's like, I'm not really interested in uh in getting into an adventure. Like, I just want to shop.

Every time I've watched this scene, I've always felt a little bit like Rikers hitting on Beverly. And I think I've come around to a different position on this, which is that Wesley becomes the kind of hang, like the third wheel that you want to get rid of immediately. And that's what I feel like Riker is doing. He's like doing that kind of adult conversation with another adult that's meant to exclude the child from it.

Yeah. And Wes it keeps just weasling his way back in.

Yeah.

He's, you know, describing this bolt of fabric as as not having been there. I wish that this bolt had shown up like When Beverly like arranges to purchase it, I wish I wish that it like we'd seen it another time, you know?

I wish the alien spacecraft that's revealed at the end was also kind of dumb. And instead of a scarf, it just started making more and more red apples. Where that scarf used to be.

After the crushers walk away, Geordie walks up. with news that the entrepreneur has arrived. I wondered did Jordy also serve on the hood? Like is Riker the only person that the hood dropped off? Because there's a lot of Starfleets walking around in this mall.

The way Riker treats him initially suggests that that's not the case. Like they don't seem to be familiar to each other at all.

That's true. It's a bit perfunctory and maybe like overly professional in a weird way.

What do you think is going on in Geordie's experience at Farpoint Station if the station is also giving him what he wants? Like suddenly all the women have very uh tightly quaffed. Cal's own hair.

Yeah.

I'm guilty of a terrible crime.

Hey, this drink has coconut in it. I love that.

I can see

So he starts like dancing a jig. And then he beams up and he's like,

Ha ha ha.

That like that's the only power that this uh spacecraft has is like the minor type of miracle, not anything epic.

Yeah. Just like kind of Benny Hinn style miracles, like So yeah, the famous moment where Riker arrives on the battle bridge, like Yar has brought him aboard and he's like, Yeah, the ship just looks terrible without the saucer section. Are you gonna do something about that?

If you're Riker, you don't see it from the outside though. Yeah. He doesn't know.

No He doesn't even know. So he gets to watch a little bit of the adventure up until now. Not the courtroom part. I guess they didn't they didn't bring a a handy cam for that. But uh he gets the gist and we learn that the saucer is on its way to reconnect. So I guess they're just reconnecting because the saucer got away from Q for long enough that they're not worried that the something, something, something

Yeah, I think that's the case. I I really still I just there's so much fat on this episode that I would have loved to replace with Wharf's B story on the saucer section. You really could by just taking those fatty sections out and just putting in a couple lines of dialogue of him over there.

Taking complaints like over the con

This is so loud, this moment of Riker watching the episode right on the bridge without using headphones, that Picard has to go to the ready room and leave him to do it.

I love when Riger finishes watching it and he's like, This guy calls that an adventure Mama Pajama

The take there is amazing because there is six seconds of fat. It's so fun. That's how you make your time.

So he goes to talk to Picard in the ready room. Humanity is on probation.

Riker's like, Q didn't talk about me and what I've been up to, right? Like just to be clear. Like he never mentioned me at all, correct?

When he says savage, like do you think that that includes like things outside of the realm of uh quote unquote violence? Like Not to say that violence doesn't factor in in certain kind of fun ways, but where's he drawing the bright lines around that? That's just my question for no particular reason.

Picard doesn't want any part of that conversation. Instead he's like, Why don't you go redock The two parts of the ship. Oh and also do it manually.

Riker is a bit of an expert at putting it in smooth. You are qualified. Yes, sir. Then I mean now, Commander.

It's a demonstration of procedure and not technique because everything he's doing is verbal. It's not like he's got his hands on, you know, like the cranes that build buildings. Like there's joysticks and shit that you use to uh like Move the hook out and uh and swing the arm around. There's none of that here. No. He's just talking'em through it.

This is the scene where I realize that there is a problem with the Lego Enterprise D, which is that the the neck of the star drive section, the saucer does separate on that model. Yeah. The neck of the star drive section is too short. It is like too short by like two full brick heights, I I wanna say.

Can you mod it?

I mean, probably that like because I lit it, like there's there's wires running all through that model now. So there's it it would be very tricky to pull apart and fix.

But uh gonna have to smash it, Ben.

Guess what? No.

Next in the conference room, uh, Riker has a meeting with Picard where he's challenged on his working relationship with his previous captain, Captain DeSoto.

I guess this does answer the question. He was the first officer to Captain DeSoto because he was in a position to say, Nah Dog, you're not going down to that planet. No way am I letting Captain DeSoto go down there.

With that being asked and answered. There's a subject change here. Picard's like, I'm a military captain, and also Uh it's implied that I'm a cruise ship captain here too, because of all the families and kids and stuff.

And these and these white Bermuda shorts that they put me in.

It actually means that a fair bit of my job is gonna be hospitality. I'm gonna need help with that. And I'm hoping you can be the one to do it.

It is such an interesting moment of personal vulnerability for Picard that is very, very rare in this series. And now that we know a lot more of his backstory, I think I understand why. Like I feel uncomfortable with children because my childhood featured a lot of imagery of my mom being swung around on the noose that she hung herself with.

I was thinking the same thing about the mom. Like I'm I'm wondering what his problem is with kids, even though we have confirmation that his real problem was with mothers.

Becoming a parent just wasn't a priority for me after that.

Uh it seems like that's gonna be a deal. Riker's gonna help out with that. We cut over to Six Bay briefly for uh a little bit more with Jordy and his blindness. doctor Cresher prescribed some painkillers or surgery for his headaches, neither of which seems to be anything that Geordie's into at this moment in time. It's funny I was down on the planet, and like I could see just fine. When I beamed up to the Enterprise, suddenly I had this thing on my face.

I think the thing we need to keep in mind after this scene going forward is that there were two options put on the table, like surgery or modification of his eyeballs. He he rejected both. despite the fact that this visor causes him excruciating pain all the time. And so I think going forward, Just approach the Geordie character with a little bit of grace, and keep in mind that he is in excruciating pain.

that he could correct at any moment by his choice. Okay. No, thank you.

I understand.

It's like he's walking around with a fucking hair shirt. Like, okay. That's your deal. I'm not gonna feel too bad about it.

The beginning of a little sea storyline here where Riker walks onto the bridge and he's like, Hey, anybody seen Data? And Worf is like, nope, uh, he's not around, he's on special assignment. Riker will be looking for data a couple of times in this episode, and this is where we get Burlap Bones walking down the corridor with data who is going to shuttle him over to the USS Hood because He does not trust the transporter beam anymore, like he used to.

I like the idea of someone as old as McCoy wanting to hang out on the hood for a little while before he dies. Death seems so eminent for him in this scene. He he's doing that that old man shuffle that makes Data have to like walk slow.

Yeah.

To keep up with him in a very uncomfortable way?

But it's not a good thing. Do you think I could get away with like getting this corn pone in my old age? Like He is really like laying it on thick how country he is all of a sudden.

I mean when there's two syllables in the word boa That's some country ass shit, right?

Some country ass shit.

What's on your ears, boy?

Amen.

But you sound like a Vulcan. He's like uh yeah, I'm going over there uh shoot some skee ball and Maybe see if I can't beat my high score in Galaga on the hood before I shuffle loose this mortal coil.

You know they have the old uh ticket giver style papa shot over there.

Oh yeah.

You know it's great.

And the prizes are like surprisingly generous. Like you can get like not a Nintendo Switch too, but you can get a Nintendo Switch for like, you know, an attainable number of tickets.

When uh my wife and I went to Vegas to see nine inch nails, we went over to the New York, New York for a little bit and they've got like a full arcade there. Wow. On the ticket system, like you're describing. And we played Space Invaders and they had a version of Space Invaders on a just an enormous screen and you sat in a pilot seat to like shoot the invaders. Yeah. And I go first, and I feel like I do pretty good. Like I I live for a couple of minutes. Wonk wonk wonk. My my guys died.

She was like seeing the matrix.

She was. Yeah. She was also wearing a power glove.

When I was in college, somebody uh I was visiting a friend in Eugene, Oregon, and somebody gave me a brownie that I did not know contained like a spectacular amount of marijuana.

Hero Brownie.

I was like parked on a couch at at house party and I was like amazing at this like Playstation basketball game that they had on the TV. And just dozens of people sat down and attempted to beat me. And I was like, I don't even know what's going on. I don't know what any of the buttons do. I'm just amazing at this.

What a moment.

Yeah.

We get an exterior shot of McCoy leaving on the hood, and this feels like an important baton pass because Before this, I think anyone who likes Star Trek understands that the Excelsior class ship is the best type of starship in Starfleet.

Yeah.

name would you want? And for it to pull away from the D as sort of a baton pass to what the new biggest and best is is significant.

This is the future. Now. Yeah. Whorf almost punches a hole in the view screen when Q shows up on it. He's just there to remind them like this uh You know, like the clock is ticking, you got twenty-four hours to prove that you don't suck, and uh, you know, summary judgment will be will be issued at some point.

Once he blurps out of there, Riker's like, What are the what are we gonna do? If we're being spied on all the time, it's not like we can even talk about strategy without him knowing about it. And Picard's answer is We're just gonna do what we'd naturally decide to do anyway, because what I want to have happen here is for us to be judged by who we are, not anyone we're trying to act like.

We're not gonna try and do the like World War II version of this. We're just gonna do the contemporary version of this.

the stuff that you would need to build FarPoint station on the planet, all they really have is this geothermal advantage. So like m maybe they have found a way to like export energy off planet.

And that could be useful for what we're trying to do and building star bases.

Pretty exciting actually.

Card's like, I gotta see this place for myself. Before he gets to do that, uh he walks Riker back out to the bridge, and that's where Riker encounters Troy. And they are both surprised to see each other. I think if Riker did any preparation before Accepting the assignment to the D? Like a big part of the XO's job is knowing the crew manifest. How does he not know Deanna Troy is there?

Maybe he like is a cram the night before the test kind of guy and uh

He was cramming before leaving the hood. Tell you that. Oh yeah. Up top.

They know each other's abilities, and he does remember what she taught him. He can hear her thoughts, which I love the fact that that's learnable. Yeah. Like other people don't know how to do it, but you can be taught is is a very exciting element to Beta Z telepathy that I don't think I've thought about much.

I love the sequence of scenes that we get here. We get the moment where Troy and Riker are speaking only using their minds and then we get some pretty hard pushback by Grappler Zorn as soon as he learns that there's a betazoid as a part of the Dustbuster Club. He's like, I leave me out of that. I don't want any of that mind stuff happening here.

I really like how subtle it is the way they reveal what Troy's deal is. Like there's some bell ringing at right at the beginning, like I'm sensing a thing that is very advanced and and and very weird. But she is not described as just like local telepath. on board the ship. There's not like exposition around it in an interesting way.

We made a big deal about Tin Man. before, but this I think is the first instance of that, even before that one, because we get star bases elsewhere. Which is just so unnecessary. More unnecessarier than Tin Man, I think.

Mm-hmm. It's like he's really making a far point. Every time he says something.

Troy interrupts the conversation with a great big feeling of pain and loneliness and despair, and whatever else the thesaurus. she has in her lap, is uh is giving her his synonyms. Not from Riker, though. Or the Grappler even. And no one knows what she could be referring to.

Grappler Zorn does look like the uh the gif of Jordan Peel sweating bullets, though, when she starts talking about this.

His defensiveness is a real turnoff for Picard. And like it's enough for him to just sort of cut the meeting short because he doesn't give a shit.

Grappler's threat to do business with the Ferengi.

Right. Let's hope they find you as tasty as they did their past associates. He basically shit talks Grappler Zoran. He's like, It sounds like you haven't heard much about them. Uh if you think that I'm worried that you would be a collaborator of any kind with them.

It's like how the network responded to us when we told them we were thinking about going independent. They were like, go ahead. You really think that's gonna work out for you?

Yeah.

Yeah. And then cut to us looking like Jordan Peel, sweating bullets.

Yeah.

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We come from there to Enterprise where Riker is looking for data and ends up finding him on the holodeck. I said before this is a bad data episode. And I mean that because if what you want is a superheroic robot crew person, what you get instead is a whistling, misunderstanding Lenny type.

And his energy is so smarmy in this. When when Riker comes up and finishes the tune, the way Data reacts is like I I instinctively put my hand over the top of the beverage I was drinking. How easily humans do that. I still need much practice.

That is a great description. If someone with this personality sat next to you at the bar, I would want to move.

This is the scene where his makeup looks the weirdest.

It's also I think the only scene we get in Star Trek where someone throws a rock and hits the wall of the holodeck. Yeah. Here's what I don't understand about this. Is there a wall there? Like if if Riker was like, oh, there's a wall there, uh could he have walked into it? Or would the wall have moved in relation to where he is?

I think like the ground under you is being like created and therefore can like can be shifted by the holodeck.

It would have to be that. But I like and understand how little detail they give. to how it works functionally. Yeah. Like the rock is kind of a spectacular trick to do. And that's all you're supposed to know about how this works at this point.

They really hang a lantern on what the data character is supposed to represent to the audience by calling him Pinocchio. Uh, and they also show a little bit more of what makes him special when he pulls Wesley out of the drink. You know, he can just do that one handed by grabbing the the front of the you know, the thing that is most impressive about him lifting Wesley up out of the water by taking hold of the front of his sweater is like

When you are lifted up in a way that you don't expect, that tends to hurt. And uh Wetley doesn't seem to suggest that he's feeling that way at all when he's marched toward the door and runs into Picard, who has that look on his face, like that expression he has when he when he sees Riker and he's like, Is this your idea of keeping me out of trouble with children? Yeah.

Yeah.

I I'm awkward around them maybe because they're always wet around me. Sir Maybe I should get something to wipe this water up. Or I'm always delivering the bodies of their dead fathers to them. Like that's another aspect to what feels so strange in our relationships.

One time I dropped a bottle of olive oil in the aisle at the grocery store, like pulled it off the shelf, slipped out of my hand, shattered. One of the most obnoxious things to clean up and The guy who would be like, you know, clean up on aisle four was restocking like right next to me when I did it. And the look. that Wesley gives Picard when he's dripping on the on the deck of Picard's fancy new ship is the exact look I gave that guy.

When I worked at a grocery store that was often my job, I would clean that up and I gotta tell you, Ben, I would rather clean up barf a hundred times out of a hundred than olive oil. It fucking sucks.

Olive oil and glass is like

Yeah.

One of the worst combinations there is.

We cut over to Six Bay where I think drying Wesley off was a medical procedure that he had his mom do. They get into a conversation about how badly he wants to go to the bridge, and mom sort of sees trouble coming, tries to prevent it, and it's a scene that feels like kind of a whatever, like kind of a throwaway until you consider like How great of a mom Beverly has to be to put up with Wesley every fucking day. And not blow her brains out with a phaser. Yeah.

I have some friends that have like a teenage super genius only child and like it is a two parent job.

Yeah.

It's a lot.

Do you relate to them really well?

I can just like kind of talk them through what it's gonna be like, you know. Because I was such a smarty pants back in the day.

Do not make up a fake name when you go to summer camp. Just be yourself.

So later the away team is uh tasked with kind of like all right, we've we've got the shopping mall aspect of this Starbase figured out. Let's go figure out the the sewer part. See if that reveals anything.

I love how Riker suggests that like, okay, yeah, me and Data will be topside. You, Geordie, Troy and Yar, you deal with the sewers. You're gonna be going down there.

And uh Geordi is like, yeah, I mean this stuff is just a bunch of very strange materials. Now all the stuff upstairs is regular stuff. I've seen it a million times out of a million. But uh down here, like I don't know what any of this stuff is. Riker's like, What about you, Troy? Anything unusual? And she's like, I guess doing the uh empath version of two fingers in the ears going la la la la la I can't hear anything.

the thing she's trying to prevent happens when she lets it in and Riker and Data beam to their position and uh like do a little bit of triage with her.

Yeah, Raggers like sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. I uh I should have listened to you the first time. I'm so sorry.

I think Marina Certis is given a raw deal this episode with her dialogue because it is nothing but repetitive synonyms for what she's feeling. Like I wish she was telling more of a story about how she's feeling instead of just using single words and words that are like those words as a way to describe what she's going through.

I almost wondered if they like used multiple takes of the same script. chunks with her because she'll say like a whole phrase and then she'll say the exact same phrase again, just with a different a slightly different spin on it.

Uh the problem isn't just hers. Like Jordi in this scene says something like There's nothing in these tunnels that I recognize or have even heard of. Like you only need to say one of those.

Yeah. Things are not going great for the away team, nor are they going great for Wesley, who arrives on the elevator at the back of the bridge, and unlike when Riker arrived on the battle bridge, Picard does turn around. And he does yell at Wesley. What the hell? Children are not allowed on the bridge.

Does Picard turn around every time that turbo lift door opens?

Yeah.

That would be exhausting.

Yeah.

Eventually he puts like a uh like one of those like uh rear view mirrors you can get for a bike helmet on, you know.

That would suck.

Or the sunglasses and pack of cigarette combo from True Lies. Like he like there's just like up on the horseshoe there's a a pack of Lucky Strike with one of the cigarettes. Pointed at the at the turbo lift or Picarta sitting there in the in the captain's chair with his sunglasses on.

No no. Donna Ron. Picard denies his true nature here because you can see him struggle with this. Like initially he does not want Wesley there. He's surprised to see him there, but eventually invites him onto the bridge for a look. This Picard and Jack Cresher connection. The only reason to not have a relationship with Wesley after he died is probably because Picard had a thing with Beverly During, right?

Yeah. It feels very much like that is the case and So much so that it almost causes like a context collapse for him when he sees her son. It's like he both knows that she is a single mother with the son of Jack Cresher in her charge, but he also knows her as

yeah it seems that way

Needless to say, uh they did not figure out exactly how this show was gonna work in the pilot episode.

The saucer that they have incoming scans Enterprise with a purple beam and we cut to the tunnels below Far Point Station. where they've been blocked from communicating with Enterprise. It's not just that they were prevented from being recalled. Like they can't even talk to each other at all.

feels very suspicious. So they're gonna See if they can make their way to the surface the old fashioned way. And back on the bridge, Wharf is like, you know, I'm looking through all of the like ship silhouettes we have in the in the logbook. There is nothing even close to this. It's Huge. It's like a very low detail model relative to the to the ship we're on. So that's kind of weird, but it's also way bigger than our ship.

If Worf had access to a Toys R S catalog, he would have drawn the equivalence to the Simon game that the saucer is obviously based on.

Ha ha.

You know what, he grew up on Earth with those human parents. He should know.

He should know. This saucer starts bombarding the old bandy city from orbit, and the sewer crew are like coming out and like kind of getting to the edge of the sewer and they can they can hear and detect that something pretty crazy is going on on the surface. My God.

Was that a phaser blast?

Negative. But something similar.

Amen.

Riker and Data are like, we're gonna go check it out. The three of you Back to the ship.

Do you need North America's largest soundstage to show a city explode like this? I know this doesn't look great, but I love watching a model train set explode effectively, which is what we get here.

I don't even mind that they use the same clip a couple of times. Yeah. Like

What?

It looks fantastic in in H D. I love it. It just looks great.

There's a quality to Grappler's orn that I think we've gotten all the way up until now, but especially now, which is that He's so annoying with how he begs and how smarmy he is.

Thank you very much. You can drive it away!

Drive who away, Graplin. I don't know. Unlikely, sir.

You get more complicated bad guys later on in Star Trek where you aren't quite sure what their deal is. And I think if this episode were positioned at the end of the season or in later seasons, I think Rappler Zorn is a little more neutral of a presenting character than you get here. I think they kind of give him away early.

Dropler Zorn seems like a betting man and he is like on a really long odds bend right now. And really fucking hoping that it pays off because if it doesn't, he's ruined. But if it does, he's gonna be like, Hey man, I'm fucking Groppler's Horn. I did the big thing, you know?

Why won't the alien ship that they've enslaved create a bunch of weapons they can use to repel Enterprise and the other saucer in orbit, I wonder?

Yeah.

Graph roller's like make me a weapon, you fucking flying saucer, and it just gives him another bowl of apples.

What exactly is the power they have over the jellyfish? Like if he like stamps his foot real hard, is it gonna hurt?

Hard to say. I don't know.

He begs for help from the Enterprise and meanwhile Riker and Data are like running around phasering down doors and radioing up to the ship, like, yeah, this is all uh everything that's coming down from orbit is hitting the bandy city and nothing is hitting Farpoint. But uh yeah, like those guys are getting absolutely torn the fuck up. And Picard is like, that Zorn guy. has been suspicious as fuck from jump. Why don't you go illegally extract him from his office and bring him up here and

This is an interesting moment for Q to show up again because he's like, Why would you need any more information about this? Why don't you just shoot it? The way humans always do when they're encountering something they don't understand.

The phasers are warmed up and ready to go and Picard is like, Hey man, those are just there in case you need to get the fuck out of here. I am in like a situation right now and you're not really welcome on the bridge.

It's funny how Q misunderstands what Picard's referring to because he's like, Oh yeah, this is kind of a heated situation. Uh it's dangerous with both of you having your fingers on the trigger. And uh what Picard actually means is he needs to go to six bay. to uh smooth things over with Beverly after their last interaction.

Get off the bridge. Both of you. You have a perimeter alert, sir. As my son tried to tell you. This. just shattered my brain because we and everyone else have roasted Star Trek Discovery for all the times mid emergency. Somebody has gone and said all of the feelings that they should have said in the earlier scene. And it is fucking amazing how much that is the energy here when Picard just walks down and he's like, hey.

This is another moment where I'm like, what are you doing, Picard? Like, do you not understand your crew roster and how they got there? He's very passive about the crew at this point and his knowledge of them, just like Riker was.

Yeah.

Anyway, this whole thing could have been cleared up if they just talked to each other. The problem is they just saved it until now.

If I had had any objections to serving with you, I wouldn't have requested this assignment, Captain. His Duty is both to please that booty and to apologize to that booty.

I mean I'm not gonna give it a total pass, but uh but I'm a little more understanding now, I'll say that.

Yeah.

So a Dust Special Club is formed and it's sent over to the saucer ship and once Riker and Data and Yar and Troy make it over there. It made me think that this should be the standard configuration of Dustbuster Clubs for the entirety of Star Trek the Next Generation. I mean, maybe Wharf sometimes. Like after Yar dies especially, but

You need a little muscle, but

Yeah.

He slid uh the slider all the way up on strength and all the way down on stealth and lock picking.

Yeah.

I will learn to do better, sir.

Thank you.

We have a long voyage ahead of us.

And it's like Troy as emotional bloodhound is the thing that makes me wish she were involved in so many more missions of this kind. Like she picks up a little hit. Riker takes one of Grappler Zorn's rags and like and holds it under Troy's face, like Find him, girl.

Another great example of Star Trek being the most efficient sci-fi franchise, they get to use the same set as they did for the sewers for the inside of this ship. And uh Troy is reporting lots of like anger and reprisal-based emotions. And uh they find Zorn. He is in this like column of purple light being tortured slowly.

Do you feel like like we've seen agonizer booths and they're very much like a telephone booth? You're standing up, you're being agonized. Do you think horizontal agonizer booth is worse? somehow, or is it better because at least you're lounging during

It doesn't feel like he's lounging though. Like it feels like to be in the position he is, he's exerting ab strength.

Yeah.

Which I bet makes it even more agonizy. If that's a word.

It's an abonizer booth.

Yeah. Which is also coming to podshop.biz if you want to get absolutely toned. flat belly for the summer, you know? Get the eye bagonizer.

On the bridge Q arrives again because time is up. That deadline is now passed.

absolutely begs him for the chance to help his crew over there on the saucer.

Interesting the way Picard is kind of put in a zorny position with Q, like made to mule and gravel. It's so disrespectful too. Like it it it reminds me of the scene in Pulp Fiction when uh Sam Jackson Eats that guy's burger like When Q is on the bridge and sits down in Picard's chair, like everybody not Picard on the bridge, like runs at him, like w like we cannot fucking let him sit in that chair. And Picard's like, no, no, no, chill, chill. Okay, wait, hold on. Let me let me talk to this guy.

Right.

And like Q is trying to take credit for the way team beaming back over. Like Picard had begged him to save their lives, and Q was like, All right, hey, look at that. And That wasn't you Q that was the song.

The Dustbuster Club is finally able to confirm Fark Point Station is an alien that can convert energy into matter, and it was trapped there by the bandy and forced to give it what they want. And Picard orders that trapped alien to be fed with an energy beam sent from Enterprise. And once it's fed, it's able to like free itself from underground.

Ha ha.

What a thing.

This pair of jellyfish are gonna be a good ally to have going forward in case you ever need like a being of awesome capability to back you up on something, right?

It's true.

We've done them a favor, perhaps they will in turn do us a favor at some point in the future. Q is like uh I gave you too easy of a problem. I I should have read up on you. I didn't realize you were a Dixon Hill fan, like you know how to solve a mystery. You know all the beats, you know.

Do you think Enterprise could have destroyed these flying saucers?

The Enterprise can blow up a planet, so I think pr Probably.

I think that's what Q wants to see and that's why he leaves in a huff.

Yeah.

Who doesn't want to see a show like that?

Like like Q is the kind of guy that's like going into the dark web to see like fucked up shit on the internet, you know.

Yeah. So Q's out of there. Far point station is gonna be rebuilt using non alien slave technology, I guess.

Pretty much nobody in this that gets defeated by Picard is particularly honorable in their defeat. And That feels like a real like statement. Like Picard is going to be honorable no matter what the outcome is, his adversaries will often not be.

Yeah, speaking of statements, Picard gives us the show's first engage. And the ship goes to warp at the end of the episode, Ben.

AMAZING!

You're the captain.

Ben, how does this modern era of new Star Trek change your perspective on rewatching this episode?

I thought a lot about starting a Star Trek series. when I was watching this and, you know, Discovery being like in in some ways, like I feel like you can think of the modern Star Trek shows, aside from the animated shows, like as almost all one Yeah. You know, like the pilot of that one thing that is a new take on the Star Trek franchise. And I think that in many ways this. suffers from the same pitfalls and achieves some of the same amazing highs as as those series do.

I agree. I thought a lot about how you have to nail the ship design to really create a sense of wanting to live in the future, wanting to be there and be on that ship and, you know, the fantasy of commanding it for yourself. Like if people wondered why the D played such a big part of the third season of Picard. It's because the ship is one of the main characters of this show, and it starts with this episode.

Even after the refit and like the problems are not just outside. Like it's not just ugly on the surface. It's ugly inside too. It is a dark. Unforgiving environment in there. Everything is hard, everything is angled, everything is shiny. It looks like place that you would want to leave if you were in there.

There are good new starships being made. Like one of our FODs, like Thomas Marone, like designed starships for Star Trek Online. Yeah. And has made great ones. And I just think you have to nail that decision when you create a Star Trek series. And it has to be right. And I think so much flows from that initial choice of what your ship looks like.

I really like the USS Athena for that reason. I think that that's like one of the modern trek ships that I've connected with the most, is it it feels like a place I would want to go to. And uh interesting little bit of connective tissue trivia, Adam. the tree in the atrium in the Athena that's kind of always in the way when people are looking up to hear the commandant speaking. Same tree as in the mall at Far Point Station.

Amazing. I'm not sure quite where I stand on the Athena as aesthetically pleasing. I don't know if I've made a decision yet. That is a show that doesn't center the ship. in a way that this series does from jump, I think. So uh maybe in season two they'll do a different and better job with that.

Adam, do you want to see if there's anything in the priority one inbox?

Yeah, and then after that, uh let's do a brand new segment.

Priority one message from Starfleet coming in on secure.

Yeah, it's extra.

to buy this ship.

Ben I've unpacked a priority one message here. It's of a promotional nature.

Okay.

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Limited edition handcrafted from the original molds. And only one hundred exist in the entire They're rarer than a natural Jaeger, and this time you don't have to buy a bunch of worthless Star Trek.

The cost of hiring a plumber to fix a leaky toilet, you can have these Each Nebuchadnezzar.

and comes in a special collectible box, perfect for displaying on your shelf, or inserting into the base of an unsuspecting Starfleet officer's neck.

Costs roughly the amount of facts in a way that only a nerd coveting a scarce science fiction related object can appreciate. But wait, there's more. You will never be able to explain or defend this purchase from your partner or family, but you can to us. We'll understand and observe. We will forgive you and thank you, because the R and D and production of these Nubbin bugs was astronomical. Experiment that will only work.

Don't wait. Don't let these parasitic ones.

Don't covet another FOD.

I know you will.

We really uh ate and left no crumbs with the whole Nub and Bug project, gotta say.

I love that spot. Thanks to Erica for a fun reminder about that project.

Here's one from eWYSI and it's urgent to Ben and Adam. Goes like this. I have a solution to the breadstick power hour dilemma. Kavas is a fermented bread drink. Quickly! You still get the bread theme, but without the chewing noises or the dry mouth. It's efficient, thematic. And classy. If you are lucky, Eastern Europeans might actually be impressed by your commitment to bread-based beverages.

When I was in Poland, I never encountered Kavas.

It really sounds like something Klingon's invented, doesn't it?

Uh I'm looking it up and uh it's definitely Slavic.

Oh man, very fun like the the Cyrillic fonts on these cans that I'm seeing.

Yeah. I mean there are a number of great bottle shops around LA. I'm sure we could source it and do it. Yeah. At some point. Sounds like fun.

Alright, well something to consider, Adam.

And then we got a final priority one message here. It is from Mark J. It's to you and me. And their message goes like this. I started rewatching TNG to escape 2016 and quickly found the most embarrassing podcast possible to listen to. Road drop.

Thank you for blazing through nearly all of Star Trek to keep the embarrassment going for 10 years. It's gotten me through COVID and moving abroad for work. Looking forward to the next 10 years of complete embarrassment.

Wow. Hey Ben Sisko made the uh the pilot.

Yeah.

That's fun.

I mean, it's gonna take longer than ten years the next time we go through it. Uh I hope you've got an appetite for that, Mark J.

Yeah, I hope our bodies survive that. Thanks to everyone who got a priority one message. If you would like to purchase one for yourself. Uh you can follow the link at greatesttrek.com or go right to podshop.biz and book it today. One thing that people who become uh supporting members can look forward to is discounts on everything at podshop.biz, including priority one messages. So if you want to become the Plaveem or the Raz of the next time through. This might be a way to uh you know.

Yeah, priority one messages support the show and uh now one hundred percent of a priority one message goes towards that. So good job.

What happens now? We already said who all the Shimotas were for all episodes of Star Trek. I feel so lost.

Ben it's time for a game.

I'd like to see your neuroflex tear'em down.

You and I have been friends for a long time. True. So what do you say we test out how well we know each other with a game of who do you think you are? I am. That's right.

You are, I am!

Here's how this is gonna go. We're gonna take turns. First, I am going to choose a character from this episode that most reminds me of you.

Okay.

And you'll select a character from the episode that you feel like you most identify with. We're gonna see if those two things match.

Mm-hmm.

If our answers match. You will win. Okay. If they don't You will lose. This is a game that you might feel like is familiar, like uh like the newlywed game. WRONG

Yeah.

This is legally distinct from that. This is not the same thing at all.

Okay, good, good.

Mainly because the stakes are different. Sure. Because if you get this right, Ben. I will have to write a sex rap song about Deanna Troy and Commander Riker.

Okay.

Because there's obviously still some smoke there, right? And if you get it wrong, you will have to do that yourself.

Okay.

Which kinda means no matter who does it. That new song is gonna get put into the bonus feed this week. It's one of those games where no matter who wins, the friends of DeSoto lose. Are you ready?

Yeah.

Guess I'm ready.

Okay, so so Ben, I have written down the name of a character that reminds me of you in this episode. And what I want you to do is do the same thing. Okay. Who reminds you of you? Who do you identify with most in this episode?

Let me get a piece of paper here.

So this is who do I think Adam thinks I am most like in this episode?

Correct.

Okay. It's a real theory of mind problem and uh as as a neurodivergent weirdo I t But you struggle with these kinds of challenges.

It should be said.

Yeah, um, yeah. Someone has IDD.

They say it on every fucking podcast

Okay, Ben, I have written down who I think you are and I'm gonna reveal mine first and see if yours matches, okay.

Okay?

I have written Commander Riker.

Aww you little so and so

You're not gonna think that after I tell you why. He for some reason didn't do any prep before transferring to Enterprise. Here here's the thing. In my mind you are way more comfortable with winging it than I am. I'm I actually admire this about you. That aspect to Riker's character reminded me so much of you here. Like, yeah, I'm just gonna go transfer over to Enterprise, I'll figure it out once I'm there. That to me felt like Ben. So so who did you write down?

You know what I did? I wrote down the character that I aspire to be a lot more than the character I am actually like. That winging it thing is has been my mode for a long time, and it is something I'm really trying to unlearn. And one consequence is that

I think a lot of people out there would guess that.

And he's not like that. He's he is an autodidact. He finds the time to do his projects and does them. You know, he may miss a social cue or two, which I identify with, but I'm I'm trying to become Wesley. I'm I I think I currently am more of a Riker.

That's some kind self-talk, Ben.

I guess that means I owe a uh a dirty ass rap to the friends of DeSoto.

Specifically about Trojan Riker. Yeah, look for that in the bonus feed. Ben, just for fun, why don't we do a second round where we where we flip the script? Okay. Why don't you write down the character that reminds you of me and I will do the same for myself?

No stakes to this. This is just Yeah. Alright. I'm going to reveal my answer to you now, Adam.

Picard.

Picard.

Why?

Because of an interaction that he has with Riker, that look we we spend a lot of time in his other ready room in the Battle Bridge, which I don't think we ever see again. I think that the Battle Bridge Ready Room feels a lot more like the clarinet rental closet that we've spent so much time in recently.

Sure does.

Bulkheads, it is not a comfortable place to stand up straight in, especially if you're a tall drink of water like Commander Riker. And he has that that brief meeting with Picard where he you know, he's he's come aboard, he's learned of the situation with the queue, he has not yet been challenged to put it in. But um He leaves this conversation, which is the first real conversation he has with Captain Picard. They go to a high close-up of Picard as Riker walks out of the room.

And that reminds you of me? Yeah. Wow.

Wow.

Yeah.

I do kind of have a resting.

Not asshole, just concerned that this may not be the right one for you.

All right. Uh then we're not a match here because uh I selected for myself the blue flying saucer. Here is why. This thing is pissed about what happened to uh to uh being close to it and goes absolutely Charles Bronson on the old town as a result. Yeah. I can be grudge holdy against folks who are are bad to my people and uh I So some vengeance in the

The retributive justice practiced by space jellyfish is maybe a regrettable thing. You know, maybe Q should have focused his powers on the way they behave because it seems like maybe a little bit more harm reduction and uh and restorative justice would have been something that they would like to consider as a species.

Yeah, I don't know if I'd go that far.

Take it away, Wendy. Bye bye.

The Greatest Generation is an Uxbridge Shimoda podcast. It's hosted by Adam Pranica and Ben Harrison, and it's produced and edited by Wendy Pretty. Next week We'll be back with another episode of Star Trek The Next Generation. So grab some hair gel, get your favorite fully functional robot, because we'll be talking about season one, episode three.

Shimoda.

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